Bettering Yourself - 3D Environment Collection
Hey everyone,
Recently I read an article from www.worldofleveldesign.com called "Deliberate Practice for Level Designers and Game Environment Artist". Here's a link if you want to go check it out. After reading said article, I decided that I would try and put some of the things discussed into practice.
I'm currently in a producer role, but was trained as a 3D environment artist. I figured what better way to keep my skills up and ideally improve them than to do little "challenges" 3-5 times a week (or as much as I can fit into my weekly schedule). These are very short challenges, normally 30-90 min each, where you pick a specific item or skill to work on and you dedicate that challenge to working on it.
With working on these and wanting to progress my skills I figured it would be a great thing to start a thread to document the challenges.
All that being said, this thread is going to be my location to post each challenge and what ever comes from each one (no matter how bad they look) and I'll probably include some "post challenge" notes on what I learn.
Thanks for checking out the thread guys and feel free to post any comments below!
Recently I read an article from www.worldofleveldesign.com called "Deliberate Practice for Level Designers and Game Environment Artist". Here's a link if you want to go check it out. After reading said article, I decided that I would try and put some of the things discussed into practice.
I'm currently in a producer role, but was trained as a 3D environment artist. I figured what better way to keep my skills up and ideally improve them than to do little "challenges" 3-5 times a week (or as much as I can fit into my weekly schedule). These are very short challenges, normally 30-90 min each, where you pick a specific item or skill to work on and you dedicate that challenge to working on it.
With working on these and wanting to progress my skills I figured it would be a great thing to start a thread to document the challenges.
All that being said, this thread is going to be my location to post each challenge and what ever comes from each one (no matter how bad they look) and I'll probably include some "post challenge" notes on what I learn.
Thanks for checking out the thread guys and feel free to post any comments below!
Replies
Challenge: Choose a plant and make a "finalized" prop.
Time: 90 min
So day 1 I decided I would do something relatively simple. I chose a seemingly simple object and decided to see how far I could get the object to a final state. I gave myself 90 mmin and did no research ahead of time as to what type of plant or pot I wanted to create.
What I learned:
Even with doing a simple object like a little plant it is really difficult to take an object from concept to completion in only 90 min. Regardless I got as far as I far as I could. By the end I was rushing to get any sort of texture on it and with being is such a rush I was relatively okay with it.
C&C are welcome below!
Reference:
Results:
I do have to say I am on the verge of embarrassment for uploading these, but given a 30 min time frame it is quite difficult to model a shoe. Especially for the first time ever trying such an object. If you have never given yourself a short time frame to do something like this I really encourage you to try it out and see how far you can get.
Here's to hoping that future posts start looking a little better and as always comments and critiques are always welcome.
I think these challenges are a good idea, especially if you take stock afterward and then research ways you could save time/ improve technique or workflow and apply them the next go 'round.
Here are larger images for those that would like to see them.
[URL="[URL=http://s875.photobucket.com/user/chasebueker/media/2014-02-13_22-04-33.png.html][IMG]http://i875.photobucket.com/albums/ab313/chasebueker/2014-02-13_22-04-33.png[/IMG][/URL]"][/url]
[URL="[URL=http://s875.photobucket.com/user/chasebueker/media/2014-02-13_22-03-22.png.html][IMG]http://i875.photobucket.com/albums/ab313/chasebueker/2014-02-13_22-03-22.png[/IMG][/URL]"][/url]
[URL="[URL=http://s875.photobucket.com/user/chasebueker/media/2014-02-13_22-10-25.png.html][IMG]http://i875.photobucket.com/albums/ab313/chasebueker/2014-02-13_22-10-25.png[/IMG][/URL]"][/url]
good luck
I feel the exact same. I'm in that situation where I feel pretty strong with my modeling, but I know my textures could kick my quality level up a few notches. What I plan to do for future challenges is focus on both texturing in Photoshop along along with normal map baking from high poly models. I think that is a key for me personally to get to the next level. Thanks for the response!